


I Wanna Be Your Boyfriend

by MonstrousRegiment



Category: Captain America (Movies), The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Hurt/Comfort, M/M, PTSD, PUNK BUCKY, Panic Attack, asshole avengers is something i live for, both of them are outrageous dicks, hipster Steve
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-06-02
Updated: 2014-06-08
Packaged: 2018-02-03 04:59:28
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 5
Words: 13,246
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1732061
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/MonstrousRegiment/pseuds/MonstrousRegiment
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Bucky (the appallingly punk kid) gets drunk and accidentally breaks into Steve's (the outrageously hipster kid) apartment.  </p><p>Honest mistake! He was trying to break into Natasha's next door. </p><p>Romance happens. (Somehow.)</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. First Impressions

**Author's Note:**

> I'm trash and decided to troll punk discography for the title. Whatever, it fits! 
> 
> This fic is a mashup of the following Tumblr ideas: 
> 
> http://pidgeyons.tumblr.com/post/86024389318/punk-bucky-and-his-tiny-hipster-boyfriend-3
> 
> http://majesticfaequeenpips.tumblr.com/post/87386153946/tickatocka-i-really-want-an-i-accidentally
> 
> http://murphels.tumblr.com/post/84204480251/high-school-au-where-badboy-bucky-begrudgingly

It’s a cold morning, low winter sun breaking grayish through the blinds in the living room, only half lowered. Stripes of silvery morning light paint across the floorboards of Steve’s living room, across the coffee table with its art and illustration books and sketchpads. The couch faces away from the window, so the light doesn’t quite illuminate it, not at this hour and not at this intensity of sunlight, but all the same—

There’s someone sleeping in his couch.

“What the hell?” he asks, dropping his keys noisily on the tall counter that divides kitchen from living room.

The form in the couch doesn’t stir. Steve can see well enough to spot naked skin in the silvery sunlight, so—not only does he have some stranger sleeping on his goddamn living room couch, but also it’s a _naked_ stranger.

Angrily unwinding his long scarf from around his neck, Steve stalks to the wall and flips on the lights.

The naked stranger in the couch—oh, actually, just shirtless, he’s still wearing pants—flinches awake and sits up abruptly.

A long moan of remorse at the motion follows, and the stranger has the gall to _flop back down on the couch_. 

“Hey!” Steve stalks to the couch and comes to stand over the stranger. He intends to rain pain upon him, but actually gets sidelined by miles of unblemished skin stretched over tight flat muscle, small hard nipples, and a dark trail of hair down to the belt holding up the pants.

By the time he manages to drag his eyes up to the face—a very nice face to go with the very nice body—the stranger’s managed to crack open his eyes, to about half-mast.

“Who the hell are you?” he asks, voice a dry rasp.

“Who the hell are _you_?” demands Steve, insulted. “I _live_ here.”

The stranger squints at him in the half-light, then makes a show of looking around the living room, propping himself up on an elbow in a way that makes skin and muscle shift across his bare torso in a rather distracting way. Steve catches himself almost backing up a step, and squashes the impulse. He’s not about to give ground to some hungover hobo that broke into his apartment in the middle of the fucking night.

“Oh yeah,” the guy mutters. “This isn’t Nat’s apartment, is it?”

Steve stares at him. Alright, this is starting to make sense. Natasha has odd friends. ‘Odd’ being the mildest word Steve can apply to them.  “Natasha? She lives next door.”

“Damn,” says the hobo, laboriously sitting up and letting a leg drop from the couch. The other, folded up, falls open against the back of the couch, so he sits up in a careless, cocky sprawl. “I must have been really drunk last night, man. Sorry.”

“ _Sorry_? You broke into my apartment! Is that usually what you do when you get drunk?”

“I thought it smelled funny in here,” the hobo says, blinking.

Steve squawks in indignation. “My apartment does not smell funny!”

“Is that coffee?” hobo asks hopefully, half-lidded blue-green eyes sliding to the kitchen island.

“I surprisingly didn’t get you coffee, because I don’t know who you are and you’re not supposed to _be here_. Seriously, what is wrong with you? What even is your name?”

“Oh,” says the hobo, extending out a hand for a handshake. “I’m Bucky. I guess we got off on a, uh, strange foot. I went out drinking last night and I was around this area and I thought I was breaking into Natasha’s apartment. I guess I was a lot more drunk than I thought. Sorry I crashed in your couch.”

Steve sighs. “I’m Steve. I’m Natasha’s neighbor. And out of the kindness of my heart, I’ll make you some coffee.”

“You’re an angel,” says Bucky emphatically, widening his eyes in comical intensity. Steve bites back a smile and goes to the kitchen to start the coffee maker. Bucky groans and grunts as he laboriously puts his boots on, climbs unsteadily to his feet, and hunts across the living room for a shirt that he’s discarded on an armchair.

Finally he slides into one of the tall stools to the kitchen island, moaning in a frankly indecent manner when the coffee starts to percolate and the scent fills the kitchen.

“I feel like roadkill,” he confesses.

“You smell like you alchemized your blood into whiskey.”

Bucky sniffs at himself and makes a face. “Sorry, pal. Hang on. Did you just use the word ‘alchemized’ in a conversation?”

Steve gives him an unsure look. “Is this a conversation? I don’t want to tax your current mental skills.”

Bucky looks at him with something like admiration, those lovely eyes sliding up and down the length of Steve’s body. “You have kind of a big mouth for someone who weighs thirty pounds soaking wet.”

“Did you want that coffee in a mug of thrown in your face?”

Bucky clutches at his chest dramatically, affecting an expression of devastating heartache. “Have mercy, Stevie.”

“Don’t call me Stevie,” drawls Steve, getting a mug down from the cabinet. “How did you get in here anyway? I locked everything.”

Bucky twists around on the stool to squint at the windows that face the fire escape.

“I can pick those locks in my sleep, man. You gotta get better ones,” he turns around to look at Steve, smirking. “Actually, you were lucky it was _me_ breaking in. Now you know you need better locks, and I didn’t steal any of your shit.”

“Ah,” says Steve, unimpressed. “Bucky, your friendly neighborhood criminal, out to test everyone’s locks for the betterment of humanity.”

Bucky grins, surprisingly white and even teeth and a crooked impish smile. His eyes crease when he grins, like he smiles with all his face, not just his mouth.

“I’m a gift to mankind,” he says, tilting his head rakishly to the side. Steve hums monotonously to disagree, though privately he’s hard pressed to do so. Bucky is very attractive and just the kind of cocky bastard that Steve likes to tease and prod.

“Oh, no, wait, I take that back,” Bucky says a moment later when Steve sits a coffee mug in front of him. “ _You_ are, Steve-o, you are a precious, precious creature.”

Steve makes a noncommitting sound as Bucky moans outrageously at his first sip of coffee. Bucky has a lovely mouth, plump and pouty and dark and the way he purses his lips in pleasure is very suggestive. The piercing on his bottom lip helps none, either, or the one on his right eyebrow, coincidentally the same style of piercing Steve has in his left one.

Steve clears his throat and sips at his paper cup of coffee, and a comfortable silence descends as they both devote all of their attention to getting caffeine into their systems. Steve lets his eyes study Bucky idly, from the way his messy, shabby hair falls around his unshaven face to the stark lines of a tattoo on his right forearm. Three black bands and what looks like a simplified sand hourglass. More lines hide behind the bunched material of his shirt where he’s shoved the sleeves up to his elbows.

A few swallows of coffee seem to perk Bucky up, and he straightens in his stool, clearing his throat.

“So, what are you, an artist or something?”

Steve arches his brows.

“Coffee table,” Bucky explains, gesturing over his shoulder with his thumb.

“Oh, right. Yeah, I’m in illustration. Mostly children’s books.”

“You any good?”

Steve blinks. “I get work,” he answers, shrugging.

“Take it easy on the ego there,” Bucky says facetiously, digging in his front jean’s pocket until he comes up with a hairband, and then Steve has to look away as he raises his arms, muscles along his biceps and shoulders flexing, to tie back his hair. Turns out Bucky has the sides of his head shaved and only the top is long. It does absolute wonders for his square, masculine face.

Steve, who has an eye for beauty and proportion, can’t but admire the strong lines of his jaw and throat. He’s so busy admiring it, in fact, that it takes him a moment to realize Bucky’s left arm isn’t quite as easy in motion as his right, like it pains him to use it, like it’s slow to react to orders.

He makes himself lower his eyes. Better stop ogling before this becomes uncomfortable and awkward.

“What do you do besides breaking into people’s apartments?”

“I do that for a livin’,” says Bucky, widening his eyes in a way certain to convey the untruth in that statement. “I’m between jobs right now. You know. With the—“ he stops, blinking, and slaps a hand to his chest. “Crap.”

He whirls around and leaves the stool, looking quickly around the living room, obviously looking for something. As seconds go by and whatever it is he’s missing fails to turn up, he grows more frantic, so Steve leaves the kitchen with intentions of joining the search party.

“What’re we looking for?”

“My tags,” mutters Bucky, falling easily to his knees to look on the floor under the couch and coffee table.

“Tags, like dog tags, like military?” Steve asks for confirmation, turning over the couch cushions.

“Yeah, I had them last night, I know I did.”

“Here,” says Steve, with sympathetic relief, fishing the ball chain from under a leather jacket that is decidedly not his own—he’s never had anything with that many zippers, he likely wouldn’t be able to hold the weight—and tugging it out.

 _Barnes, James Buchanan_ , they read. _32557241\. B POS, Catholic_.

He hands them over. Bucky out them on with obvious relief, pressing them closely under his shirt. Obviously a comfort item, and no wonder, if he’s served.

“Were you scared you coulda given them away to some pretty girl?” Steve asks, smiling.

“Nah,” answers Bucky, mouth tugging into a crooked, charming smile. “Some pretty boy, maybe my phone number. But not my tags. These stay with me.”

“Musta fallen off when you took off your shirt on some stranger’s couch,” Steve teases, idly wondering what kind of pretty boys Bucky’s into, and immediately discarding the thought.

“You make it sound so seedy,” laughs Bucky, scrunching up his face in mock distaste.

“Didn’t even know his name,” continues Steve, shaking his head in sorrowful reproach.

“Wouldn’t be the first time,” admits Bucky with another winning, wicked smirk, as he digs into the pocket of his leather jacket. “Mind if I smoke?” he asks, holding up a crumpled pack of cigs.

Steve shakes his head. “I have asthma, you can’t smoke in here. But you can go to the window.”

“Oh. No, that’s alright, it’s your place, ‘m not gonna fucking smoke it up.”

“You already broke in,” points out Steve.

“Not on purpose,” reminds him Bucky, flopping on the couch with a proprietary sprawl of endless legs. “Not my fault your locks are shitty.”

Steve scoffs. “Fine. Then change them.”

Bucky arches his brows and widens his eyes, plump mouth forming a perfect ‘o’. He lifts his left hand and points his index at Steve. Steve works at ignoring the way it trembles slightly. Bucky’s left forearm is significantly less muscled than his right.

“You know what, pal, I will,” he says decisively, getting to his feet and snatching up his jacket. N a brisk, quick manner, he wraps a grey and black striped scarf around his neck and tugs on leather fingerless gloves. Bucky seems to have a petty distinctive sense of style, veering pretty decisively into punk territories.

“Uh,” says Steve, eloquently.

“I’ll be back in an hour with new locks,” promises Bucky. “And breakfast, because it’s fucking early and I need greasy comfort food. You got a spare key?”

Steve stares at him. “Like you need one?”

“Have pity, Steve, I’m hangover, I’m not gonna climb your fire escape again.”

“I should make you,” says Steve mildly, but gets up to tug the spare key from the key hook by the front door anyway.  Bucky takes it, easy as you please, and drops it on his jacket pocket. Throwing a smirk at Steve, he opens the door—then hesitates and stops, frowning at him.

“Allergies?” he asks, surprisingly thoughtful.

“No thanks, I’ve got plenty of my own.”

“Jerk,” says Bucky, grinning. “Really, though.”

“Peanuts are the fastest way to kill me.”

“Noted,” nods Bucky, patting Steve in the head companionably, like an asshole, before slipping out into the hallway.

Bucky does indeed come back, about half an hour later, with two plastic bags. One of them has several different kind of pastries from the bakery across the street. The other one has new locks, a screwdriver, and assorted tools.

“You bought those for now? I have tools.”

Bucky looks at him doubtfully. “Did you have them before they were cool?”

Steve arches a brow. “Average wit, Barnes.”

“I like to think I’m above-average anything, babe,” Bucky grins, frankly wolfish.

“Always aim high,” drawls Steve condescendingly. “Hand over the food, squatter.”

“Not a squatter if I earn my bread,” retorts Bucky, shaking the bag with tools in Steve’s face. It’s in his left hand. He winces and lets it fall back down.

Steve hesitates. Decides not to pry. Not his business, anyway. Instead he takes out all the pastry paper bags from the bakery and puts all the food in a tray, then takes it over to the coffee table and flops on the couch. Bucky shrugs off his jacket and throws it across the arm of the couch, nearby. A whiff of cigarette smoke reaches Steve, unpleasant and harsh, fresh. He wrinkles his nose, out of Bucky’s sight, and sighs.

“You just gonna lazy it up there while I work?” Bucky asks from where he’s already kneeling by the window.

“It’s a Sunday,” calls back Steve. “What else are Sundays for but lazying it up? I mean, for well adjusted human beings who don’t break into people’s apartments?”

Bucky snorts. “I’m doing you a favor, and you had better repay me by leaving me one chocolate muffin all for myself.”

“I don’t know, it looks like I won’t be able to stop at one,” Steve says idly, though he knows perfectly well his stomach won’t handle that much chocolate. He’d just as well avoid the awful cramps, thanks.

“Yeah? You got all that attitude to make up for your size?”

“I have other things to make up for my _height_ ,” Steve snaps, twisting around to glare at Bucky over the back of the couch. The punk looks at him over his shoulder, wriggling his eyebrows. Steve scowls. Bucky laughs. Throws up his hands, one of them clutching a screwdriver.

“Okay, okay, no size jokes, I get it, sorry.”

“Do you know how many of those I have to take form people I actually like?” Steve says, still irritated.

“You like me a _little_ , Steve-o,” Bucky grins lazily at him, eyes half lidded.

God. Steve likes him more than a little.

“I’ll like you better after you change my locks, hobo.”

Bucky straightens his spine so quickly Steve fancies the bones snapping together, and executes the sharpest, cockiest military salute ever known to mankind. Steve replies by flipping him the bird. Bucky laughs, a long, rich sound that tugs at Steve’s own mouth, contagious and clear. Then he winces, pressing a palm to his forehead.

“Shit, stop being funny, my head’s gonna split in half.”

“Breaking and entry and messing up my living room with blood and brain,” Steve drawls. “I’m so glad we met.”

“Prettiest mess you’ll ever get, Stevie.”

“Don’t call me Stevie, if you want me to get you ibuprofen.”

Bucky turns wide, awed eyes on him. “Would you? I could kiss you, I swear.”

Steve laughs. He finds the ibuprofen bottle in the bathroom and tosses it at him. Bucky catches it without trouble, shakes two pills out, and swallows them dry. He lifts his arm to toss the bottle back, and then seems abruptly to reconsider. He gets up instead, crosses the living room to the bathroom door and offers it to Steve.

“Thanks,” says Steve, smiling. “I wouldn’t have caught it.”

“Didn’t want to risk hitting you in the glasses,” shrugs Bucky, scratching the back of his neck.

Steve laughs quietly. “You probably would’ve. I have shit reflexes.”

“Eh, I have great reflexes and get hit in the face plenty anyway.”

Steve watches him go back to the window and shakes his head, surprised at how fond he is of the eccentric little shit.

“What’s a good looking guy like me gotta do to get some music around here?” Bucky asks.

“I don’t know about any good looking guys,” Steve sniffs, crossing over to the shelves to plug in his iPod.

Bucky grins at him. “Don’t even pretend, pal. And stop playing the role of the injured party here, dog, you weren’t even here last night. Out all night, breaking hearts, like your mama told you not to.”

“You obviously don’t know my mama,” mutters Steve, glancing briefly at the leather jacket and its many zippers. Bucky’s probably not a fan of Mumford & Sons.

He settles for the White Stripes and goes to settle on the couch, flipping the tv on and muting it. Bucky sings under his breath, _and if I catch it comin’ back my way, I’m gonna serve it to you_. 

It’s several songs and a trip back to the iPod for another playlist before Bucky’s letting himself sprawl on the couch next to him, knees knocking companionably together. He picks up his chocolate muffin and starts tearing little pieces of it and popping them obnoxiously into his mouth, chewing contemplatively to the tune of Nirvana’s _Smells Like Teen Spirit_. His right knee, on the far side from Steve, bounces restlessly.

“You’ve got pretty acceptable taste in music, for a hipster,” he says generously.

“Oh, wow, geez, thanks, _punk_. I guess nothing compares to the Ramones.”

“It doesn’t,” Bucky says, pointing a finger in his face. “And anyway, don’t try to look insulted. You have a record player in that corner, don’t think I missed it.”

“That belonged to my dad,” defends Steve. “And, for the record, there’s nothing like vinyl records when it comes to music.”

“Oh god, don’t get started on me, I’m a fan of as many songs as I can fit into the smallest device available.”

Steve arches his brow in haughty disbelief. “ _All_ of the Ramones songs?”

“You know what, you’re begging for some musical education, and don’t think I’m too hungover to give it to you good.”

Steve snorts. “Tell me the alphabet backwards and I’ll believe you.”

“Alright, that’s it, where’s your laptop. I know you have one, I bet it’s a Mac.”

“Like I could afford a Mac,” scoffs Steve, getting up to go to his bedroom. Bucky trails after him, seemingly having no notion of personal space or privacy, and takes a long curious look at the double bed and tall design desk.

Bucky regales him with a knowing look. “Like you wouldn’t buy one if you could afford it, kid.”

“Everybody would buy one if they could afford it, jackass. And I’m not a kid, you’re not that much older than me.”

“I’m twenty-six.”

Steve scoffs, fishing his laptop bag from the side of his bed. “I’m two years older than you, prick.”

The laptop is a utilitarian and faithful HP. Bucky chooses to pass no judgment on this choice of device, and instead takes the laptop bag strap from Steve and carries it himself to the living room, kin what is either a frankly appalling tendency to appropriate other people’s things—like their couches, right—or a somewhat bewildering show of friendly politeness.

Bucky sets up in the couch with the laptop in the coffee table like he belongs there, and proceeds to spend a lazy, pleasant Sunday thoroughly educating Steve in the history and evolution of punk rock, from the Sex Pistols to The Clash. Steve watches, amused and increasingly fond, as Bucky gestures emphatically with his hands to explain things, knee bouncing, face alight with enthusiasm.

It’s not until they’re calling in Chinese food that Steve realizes why Bucky’s so restless and distracted.

“You haven’t smoked in hours,” he says, surprised.

Bucky looks vaguely embarrassed. Steve feels unexpectedly touched.

“You don’t have to do that, really. You can smoke in the fire escape.”

“Nah, I don’t wanna stink up your place.”

Steve shrugs. “We’ll open the windows. The smell will go.”

“It’s fucking freezing out there, Steve. That can’t be good for,” and he stops, looking even more embarrassed.

“My asthma?” Steve finishes for him, surprised at his hesitance.

Bucky pulls a face. “Didn’t wanna come off as condescending.”

“No, thanks. That’s—very thoughtful of you. The cold’s bad, I’ll admit. A lot of my friends smoke, though, so I’m used to the smell.”

“I can deal without a cig for a couple hours longer,” Bucky says firmly, leaning back to stretch his arms over his head, back arching. His shirt rides up, revealing a strip of bare skin above the waistband of his black skinny jeans. When he relaxes back, his knee falls against Steve’s and stays there. Steve tells himself Bucky’s just the kind of guy that takes up a lot of space. He sure looks the type. There isn’t a chance in hell a punk guy with Bucky’s looks would be flirting intentionally with a hipster asthmatic kid with glasses.

On the other hand, there is literally no need or reason for Bucky to linger in Steve’s apartment, and yet ye has, for hours. He changed the locks in Steve’s windows. Came back with pastries for breakfast. He asked about food allergies, he carried the laptop bag, he’s not smoking.

Steve isn’t what you would call egotistical, but he’s not stupid, either.

He’s about to say something to test the waters when Bucky’s phone goes off, to a frankly unexpected ringtone.

“Is that _This is Halloween_?” Steve asks, bemused.

“Shut up and help me find it.”

Shaking his head, Steve starts turning over stuff until a pink Nokia Lumia shows up.

“Are you for real?” he asks frankly, handing it over.

“Shut it, I haven’t been back long, it’s my sister’s,” mutters Bucky, missing the call by seconds and cursing. He calls back, and what happens next is a lot of apologies in very quick succession, a lot of wincing, and several moments of shamefaced listening, until whoever is on the other side of the line hangs up.

“Uh, I gotta take off,” Bucky says, apologetic, grabbing his leather jacket and tugging it on quickly. “Sorry, man, let me give you the lunch money.”

“It’s fine. You paid for the locks. And I’m sure Natasha hasn’t even remembered it’s lunch time, so she’ll eat it gladly.”

“She’s gonna kick my ass six ways to Sunday for bugging you.”

“Well, I’m sure if she can live with you being a punk jackass, she can probably live with you breaking and entering in her neighbors’ apartments.”

“You’re kind of a jerk,” Bucky says, nodding in approval. “I like you. I think I’ll keep you.”

Steve sets his hand son his hips, brows flying up. “Thanks? I guess?”

“See you around, Stevie,” says Bucky, surprisingly soft all of a sudden, smile genuine and warm.

“Ring my doorbell sometime,” Steve answers, smiling back.

“Will do.”

A brief moment of hesitation, and then Bucky leans closer and grabs Steve’s shoulder, squeezing gently in goodbye. He eases out the door without another word, tugging on his fingerless gloves, with one last look over his shoulder and a quiet click of the door latching.

Steve finds himself smiling stupidly at the door and slaps a palm over his eyes.

James Barnes is going to be a world of trouble, he can tell.


	2. A Self-Aware Punk

Next Saturday, halfway through _Django Unchained_ , the doorbell rings. Steve struggles somewhat sluggishly out of his nest of blankets in the couch and goes to the door to find Bucky, leaning lazily against his doorjamb.

“I kidnapped your key,” he confesses, lifting a hand to show it dangling from his index finger. “Figured it’d be taking liberties to just go ahead and use it.”

“Decency at long last,” marvels Steve.

“And I brought breakfast,” Bucky continues, persuasively, revealing a plastic bag with several little paper bags inside, same as last time. Then he pauses, frowning. “Don’t wanna rile you up, pal, but you look kinda bad today.”

“Having a bad… air… day,” admits Steve, moving aside for Bucky to come in.

“Shit,” Bucky steps inside, looking him over carefully. “It’s the rain, right?”

Steve blinks at him. “How’d you know that?”

Bucky shrugs and starts taking the pastries out of the bag with a nonchalance that tells Steve that Bucky isn’t willing to admit he looked asthma up on the internet to know what could trigger episodes. Which is pretty obviously what he did. Steve frowns at him.

“I hate fussing,” he says quietly. The end of that phrase is accompanied by a hitch in his breath as his lungs instinctively try to expand as far as they can around the obstruction of carbon dioxide trapped inside. Steve suppresses a wince; his ribs and back hurt already.

“I ain’t fussing, pal, I just want coffee,” mutters Bucky, turning around to inspect cabinets. “Oh hey, these are all at your height, huh?”

“My friend Sam helped me put them up,” answers Steve, snagging a cheese scone from one of the bags. “Otherwise I’d always need a stool.”

Bucky bobs his head once in agreement, taking two cups down and fumbling for a moment with the old coffee machine, another thing from the sixties that Steve inherited from his father. He’s muttering something about ‘god forbid Steve moves on from the dark ages’, but Steve can ignore it because the cheese scone is seriously good.

“Look, for the record, I’m an accidental hipster,” he admits, burrowing back into his blankets. “A ton of the things I own, I inherited, ‘cause I don’t make a lot of money. And I just like the style.”

“I mean, I can’t judge,” shrugs Bucky. “I’m wearing leather fingerless gloves. I know it’s ridiculous. I just like it.”

“A self-aware punk,” muses Steve, and coughs on the exhale of a long breath, thorax muscles sore.

“Don’t you have an inhaler or something?”

“I don’t wanna use it unless it’s real bad,” Steve mumbles, tugging the blankets up higher, feeling miserable. “Otherwise I use it all the time.”

“Don’t see a reason why you shouldn’t if you can’t breathe right.”

“Because then it’s a crutch,” Steve snaps. “And what happens the time I don’t have one? I can handle it.”

Bucky shakes his head slowly, and says nothing. Steve stares at the frozen image of Django in the frozen fields, tugging his gun quickly out of his holster. He focuses on that image and his breathing, checking the urge to breathe in as deeply as he can, because that _hurts_.

He almost startles when Bucky comes back and sets the two coffee mugs on the table in front of him, along with the paper bags of assorted snacks. The punk relaxes next to Steve, customary proprietary sprawl, cat-like and indolent, dropping one foot on top of the coffee table and throwing an arm across the back of the couch behind Steve.

“Tarantino’s your comfort movie?” he asks, arching a thick dark brow.

“Monty Python makes me laugh too much,” mumbles Steve.

Bucky hums and leans forward to snag the remote form the table. As he does, his hand drops to the back of Steve’s neck, gentle and warm. He hast to twist a little to put one of the coffee mugs in Steve’s hands, and Steve sees the moment something catches in his left shoulder, a full body flinch and a wince.

“You okay?” he asks, concerned.

“Yeah,” Bucky says through gritted teeth. “Fucking shoulder. It’ll pass in a minute.”

“War wound?” Steve asks, as delicately as he knows how.

Bucky’s mouth tugs downwards into a scowl, and he moves his arm away from Steve to drape it across his lap instead, gripping his shoulder, white-knuckled. It looks seriously painful. A small tremor shakes his hand.

“Shrapnel,” he says shortly. “Got me honorably discharged. They say I have PTSD.”

Steve looks at him, worried. “Do you?”

Bucky shrugs uncomfortably, fingers tightening on his left shoulder. “I don’t remember,” he mutters, dipping his head down to look at his hand, palm-up, on his lap. “The explosion, I mean. I don’t know what I should be afraid of, but I guess I kind of am, all the time. I dunno. There’s nothing really wrong with my arm, but it fucking _hurts_. And I can’t sleep.”

“I’m sorry,” Steve says softly, resting his hand gently on Bucky’s knee. “How long’ve you been back?”

“Six months.”

Steve startles, leaning forward to see if he can catch Bucky’s eyes. “You haven’t seen someone about the sleeping?”

Bucky laughs, a brief and hard laugh nothing like his real one. “Sure. I’m on a waiting list at the VA. Gonna grow old before they give me an appointment though.”

There’s a long silence. Finally Bucky shrugs again, a fluid, full-body shrug, like a dog shaking water off its pelt, and relaxes back in a manner that suggests he’s doing it consciously, one muscle group at a time.

“Whatever,” he says decisively. “Let’s get us some history revisionism here.”

They turn back to the movie.

It’s not until King Schulz gets shot and Steve sighs in still-fresh disappointment at his death that he realizes he never removed his hand from Bucky’s knee. If Bucky’s noticed, he certainly hasn’t objected. Steve decides to leave it.

When _Django Unchained_ ends, Bucky wordlessly gets up, gets the laptop bag from Steve’s room, hooks it up to the tv, and opens up his own Netflix account on it.

“By all means,” says Steve, amused. “Take liberties.”

“I would, pal, but you can’t even breathe right,” replies Bucky, looking at him over his shoulder, eyes bright and wicked. Steve coughs on a strangled breath, surprised at the bluntness.

“I rest my case,” comments Bucky, turning back to the laptop. He selects _Evil Dead_ and comes back to the couch like he belongs there. This time he drapes an arm around Steve’s back and pulls him in against his side, sighing.

“I pick one, you pick one,” he says. “Gonna get you through the day, easy as you please.”

Steve closes his eyes. Bucky doesn’t smell of smoke today, but of laundry soap and clean cotton.

“Didn’t smoke today?” he asks, sleepily. He had a bad night, didn’t get much sleep, and Bucky’s warm.

“Tryin’ to quit,” mumbles Bucky, eyes fixed on the tv screen.

They watch _Evil Dead_ , and then, in the spirit of things, _Army of Darkness_. They call in pizza and Natasha, who arrives in white jeans, black pumps, and a soft-looking cotton light blue button-up. She could have rolled out of a polo ad if not for the shaved half of her head, proudly on display today with the rest of her fiery red hair braided over her shoulder. Also probably not standard accessories for a rich girl are the assortment of knives and the handgun she leaves in Steve’s higher shelf.

Natasha works in private security for Tony Stark, whom she at a glance despises but is privately fond of.

“Put on _Men in Tights_ , loser,” she says to Bucky, without missing a beat, as she flops onto the couch at the other side of Steve, toeing off her pumps and removing her dangly silvery earrings, which she dumps on top of the table.

“Ma’am yes ma’am,” salutes Bucky, like a dick, and obeys.

After _Men in Tights_ , Steve chooses _Spaceballs_.

“A hipster after my own heart,” says Bucky, slapping a hand to his chest, over his heart.

Halfway through Princess Vespa’s tantrum about her luggage, Sam shows up and parks his ass on the carpet, leaning back against Steve’s folded legs.

Steve falls asleep with his head on Bucky’s shoulder half an hour into _Clue_. When he wakes up, the room is dark with night, the floor lamps in the living room lit and spilling soft yellow light. A sharp sweet scent reaches Steve’s nostrils, like strawberry syrup. A bit confused, he inhales as he lifts his head, looking blearily around.

He’s still leaning on Bucky. Realizing he’s awake, Bucky turns his face towards him, dark red lips crooking into a rakish smile, and he pulls the lollipop out from his mouth. It’s bright red and wet lie his lips.

“What,” manages Steve, and coughs on a thin, strangled breath.

“Whoa,” Bucky scrambles to help him sit up, startled and concerned. He pops the lollypop back in his mouth to help him with both hands, and it actually—doesn’t really help a lot. “Sam!”

Sam appears from the bathroom doorway, hands still dripping soapy water, startled. Wordless, he crosses at a clip to the shelves and snatches up the inhaler, putting it firmly on Steve’s hands, already uncapped. Steve sends him a sour look, but dutifully puts it to his lips and inhales, once, twice. He holds his breath as long as he can, letting the drug act.

When it finally does, and he can draw breath for the first time since last night without any trouble, he slumps back against Bucky’s arm, sighing.

“You alright?” Bucky asks quietly, combing Steve’s hair back from his forehead. Steve nods, eyes closed, inhaling Bucky’s smell of old smoke and jarring strawberry syrup.

“You don’t look like the lollypop type,” he murmurs.

“Tryin to quit smokin’,” says Bucky, and Steve realizes he’s said that before, earlier. He frowns and lifts his head, finds Bucky’s eyes, turquoise-colored in the golden lamplight, genuine and honest.

“You tryin to quit smoking so we can hang out?”

“I don’t wanna be the reason you’re like this, Steve.”

Steve stares at him for a long moment, touched. His eyes dip, almost of their own accord, to Bucky’s lips, pouty and red and wet, and he can hear his own heart beating loudly. He’s going to lean in and kiss that miracle mouth _right now_ —

“Sushi for dinner,” announces Natasha, standing right above them. Bucky flinches; his left shoulder locks and his breath catches, stuttering. Steve scrambles to move away so Bucky can get his arm properly in front of himself, the only position that seems to soothe the pain when the shoulder cramps.

Natasha reaches down, wordless, to grab him by the wrist and elbow, and start rotating the shoulder joint slowly. Bucky grits his teeth on the lollipop plastic stick, his other hand clenching on the couch cushion. It takes a long moment for Natasha’s motions to do any real help.

“You have any hot water bottles, Steve?” she asks, delicately putting his arm down.

“Yeah, sure, under the bathroom sink.”

Natasha nods and goes to find one. Bucky seems to huddle in himself on the couch, clutching his bicep tightly enough that his fingertips sink into the muscle. Steve can see real difference between his two arms, the right well-muscled and tanned and the left thin and pale. It must have been bandaged or in a cast for a long time. Shrapnel. An explosion. Christ, Bucky’s only twenty-six.

“Where did you and Natasha meet?” he asks, thinking of the expert way she worked his shoulder.

“Went through basic together,” Bucky mutters, obviously still in pain. “She got off after her first tour.”

Steve hadn’t known Natasha had been in the military, but if he thinks about it, it makes sense. Natasha has that odd, fascinating sort of economy of motion so common in highly trained soldiers. 

“What were you in, the marines?”

“Yeah,” Bucky nods. “I went on to SEAL training, and then—this shit.”

“SEAL?” Steve asks, stunned. “At twenty-six?”

“At twenty-three,” corrects Bucky. “Sniper.”

“You must have made one hell of a career.”

“The best,” sighs Bucky, eyes flicking to Steve, haunted. “Was. The best. But it’s all fucked now anyway, and I don’t really… I mean civilian life is… I dunno.” He shrugs. “I don’t wanna say hard because,” he laughs bitterly. “Getting your arm half blown off is harder, right? But in Afghanistan I could make snap decisions in the blink of an eye and over here I can’t choose what coffee I want in Starbucks. It’s all twisted around.”

“Starbucks coffee is pretty shitty anyway,” Steve says thoughtlessly.

Bucky laughs. “Shut up, it’s like your deity.”

“I drink Chai tea at Starbucks, not coffee.”

Bucky laughs harder. “Do you put soy milk in it?”

Steve scowls. “Yes.”

Bucky laughs so hard he has to bend over on the couch, roaring with laughter, shoulders shaking. It’s probably less about how funny Steve’s outrageously hipster life choices are and more about Bucky releasing stress after his shoulder pains him, after he tells Steve about his experience overseas. Steve understands that, so his scowl is only half-real.

He catches Natasha’s eyes when she brings over the hot water bottle, and they are grateful and soft like brushed velvet. Bucky sits back and puts the water bottle over his shoulder, where the heat will help relax the cramped muscles.

The sushi is fantastic. Bucky has impressive dexterity with the chopsticks, although no one is more impressive than Natasha, or more ruthless when it comes to securing her choice of rolls. Once they’re done with dinner and starting in on the ice-cream, Natasha’s friend Clint drops by, parks himself on the floor where she can cross her ankles on his shoulder, and settles in for _Shaun of the Dead_. 

They watch the whole Cornetto trilogy.

Bucky drapes his arm carefully over Steve’s shoulder and pulls him in to himself, grinning lazily, sucking on a lollypop.


	3. Rear Window

“Bundle up, princess,” says Bucky when Steve opens the door, a week later on Saturday evening. “I’m taking you for a ride.”

“With a line like that, aren’t you supposed to be endeavoring to _un_ dress me?” Steve asks, gesturing for him to come inside as he picks a long, warm scarf and a thick jacket.

“All in good time,” Bucky says, grinning toothily. “I ain’t got a reason to rush this, do you?”

Steve looks at him for a long moment. Today, Bucky’s wearing black skinny jeans, combat boots, a deep red sweater with a rip on its round neck, and a well-worn leather bomber jacket that looks big on him. His lips are as red as his sweater, his cheeks flushed with cold, eyes gleaming and clear. He looks gorgeous, and although Steve isn’t usually the type to tip into bed with a fella after meeting him twice, he has to actually put effort into repressing the urge to tug him down and bite his mouth.

“Where are we going?” he asks instead, busily wrapping the scarf around his neck to keep warm. He watches Bucky saunter nonchalantly to the shelves and snag up the inhaler without a word, because if he says something about it, it’ll be harsh.

A part of him is touched at the concern. The thing is that it’s smothered by the vast majority of him that has grown to loathe coddling. He has to remind himself that he told Bucky that cold was bad for his asthma, and that Bucky is—was—a marine. Protecting people maybe comes easy to him, like a habit, or the indulgence of a natural inclination.

“It’s a surprise, buddy,” Bucky answers, easily reaching over and dragging the zipper of Steve’s jacket up under the scarf.  “You all set?”

Steve nods, and they leave the apartment. Bucky keeps surprisingly mum about their destination all of the fifteen minutes it takes for them to walk the darkening streets, slanting cocky, attractive smiles at Steve whenever his curiosity makes him insist on an answer.

Finally they arrive at a square, one Steve knows well enough. He comes here to quick-sketch people on nice sunny days. It’s always full of kids and their dogs and lovey-dovey couples and appallingly eccentric underground theatre groups tangled up in frankly incomprehensible modern shows, most of them without a dialogue. Sometimes, circus performers string a low tightrope between the trees or hang beautiful silks from the tall branches and perform for free.

Tonight, it’s been transformed into an open-sky cinema, with a huge screen set up near the trees. Groups of people have set up camp in the grass, in nests of pillows and blankets, with thermos and baskets of food. Steve laughs, delighted, and his breath is a long column of white steam in the freezing air.

“I wish you’d told me what this was about,” he says, grinning. “I could have brought some blankets, something warm to drink.”

Bucky scoffs, slinging a proprietary arm over Steve’s shoulders and tugging him in close.

“What kind of shitty date d’you think I am, pal?” he asks, pointing his hand to someone sitting alone in a blanket, several more blankets folded carefully at his side. Steve doesn’t know him, but as he watches, he turns and spots them, waving an arm. Bucky waves, and the dude stands up and moves to another blanket a few groups of people away.

Bucky smirks and leads Steve over to newly vacated blanket. There’s one lawn chair on it, one of those low ones where you’re actually sitting on the ground propping up your back, along with at least four blankets and a cooler.

“A pretty swell one,” Steve is forced to admit, grinning helplessly.

“Pretty swell, huh, wow, what praise,” deadpans Bucky, crouching to snap open the cooler and offer Steve a cool, damp bottle of Grolsch beer.

“Don’t wanna fluff up that ego,” Steve replies, popping the cap.

“Anything else you’d rather fluff up?” Bucky asks, softly, coming in close to brush a kiss right before Steve’s ear, intimate and chaste. Steve exhales, heart kicking up, and masks his reaction with a heartening swallow of bitter beer. Bucky laughs, soft and sinful in his ear, and then peels himself away to sit on the lawn chair, legs folded up, knees spread. He pats the space between his legs, grinning.

“Couldn’t afford another lawn chair, hobo?”

“Ever heard of making do, Stevie?”

“Marine Corps taught you that?” Steve retorts, lowering himself until his back is against Bucky’s chest, and helpfully holding up both beers as Bucky busies himself draping blankets over them.

“Among other many things,” says Bucky, reclaiming his beer and settling his free hand on Steve’s stomach, easy, comfortable.

“What are we watching?” Steve asks, swallowing a mouthful of beer and relaxing against Bucky’s broad chest.

“Gonna find out in a minute,” Bucky answers, turning his left wrist to glance at his watch.

“How’s your arm?” Steve asks.

“Shitty as fuck,” Bucky answers cheerfully. “The lungs?”

“Subpar.”

Bucky guffaws. “There’re sandwiches I the cooler if you’re hungry.”

Steve stretches out and drags the cooler closer, because he _is_ hungry. He finds half a dozen sandwiches, and a couple chocolate bars, and four more bottles of beer. It strikes Steve suddenly that Bucky put a lot of thought into this; he knows Steve’s favorite beer, because he’s snooped in Steve’s fridge enough, and went through the trouble of getting it. The sandwiches look like he actually made them. There’re no nuts in the chocolate bars, a detail that would be otherwise easy to forget.

Steve leans back against Bucky’s chest, burrowing into the blankets with a pleased sigh. Bucky hums, sipping beer comfortably.

The movie turns out to be Alfred Hitchcock’s _Rear Window_. Steve huffs with delight when the title shows up. He loves classic movies.

It’s a cold night, but the blankets are thick and Bucky puts off heat like a goddamn furnace at Steve’s back. Bucky goes through two more beers without any sign of feeling buzzed, but Steve stops at the second one; he’s small, and he doesn’t drink all that much, and he doesn’t want to get drunk. The sandwiches are god, tuna and lettuce and tomato. They share a chocolate bar between the two of them.

By the time the movie ends, Steve is aglow with happiness and pretty sure he’s at least half in love with the punk jackass. He’d love to stay like he is, cradled between Bucky’s spread legs, all night; but it’s really cold, and he’s starting to breathe wrong, and he doesn’t want to have to use the inhaler in front of Bucky again.

“I’ll walk you home,” Bucky says, and finds his friend to presumably ask him to deal with all their stuff.

“You sure he can handle all of this?” Steve asks, feeling guilty of leaving someone else to deal with their mess.

Bucky shrugs. “He’s got a truck. And he owes me a favor.”

He puts his arm around Steve’s waist this time as they walk, keeping him close and smiling fondly at his rambling about classic movies and the impact Hitchcock had on cinema around the globe. He nods when Steve says they absolutely have to watch the other Hitchcock movies, and also other movies like _Casablanca_ , and that he thinks Bucky’s going to really like the campy Italian comedies form the sixties and Giulano Gemma’s spaghetti westerns. Bucky hums contentedly in vague, uninformed agreement, sucking on a berry lollipop. 

By the time they reach Steve’s apartment, it’s clear to Steve that he’s rambling like an idiot and that Bucky has a lot of tolerance for pointless babbling.

“Sorry,” he says, embarrassed, unlocking his door. “I babble when I get excited.”

Bucky leans against the doorjamb, tall and lanky and arrogant, but his smile is soft around the edges. He flicks the lollypop stick accurately towards the sink in Steve's kitchen, and his smile widens when he hits jackpot. He turns back to Steve with arched brows, eyes dancing. 

“I like it. I like you.”

Steve feels his cheeks heat. Fucking complexion, he’s actually fucking blushing, isn’t that embarrassing, especially with Bucky looking at him like that, slow smile and cool as an ice cube, cocky and self-assured and lovely.

“Like,” he says, a teasing gleam in his blue eyes. “ _Like_ you like you.”

“Shut up,” mutters Steve, fisting his hand on the front of Bucky’s sweater and dragging him down to his mouth.

Bucky inhales as their lips meet, eyes closing, hands finding Steve’s hips. Steve’s lips are chapped, but Bucky’s are smooth and cool from the night air, and his bottom is fat and pouty as Steve sucks it into his mouth, biting at it. He tastes of berry syrup, sharp and odd. Steve hasn't kissed a girl in a long time, girls with their cherry chapsticks and lipgloss, and he hasn't had a lollypop in years. It's good though, it's something he can certainly only associate with Bucky.

The lip piercing is cold metal against his tongue when he licks across it, but it warms quickly. Bucky breathes in again, angling his head, tugging his lip free to drag both of them over Steve’s mouth, sensual and slow. Steve hums, tangling the fingers of his other hand in Bucky’s hair where it’s tugged into a ponytail.

Steve sighs, nips at Bucky’s bottom lip until he opens his mouth and slides his tongue against Steve’s lips, warm and wet, teasing. Steve opens his mouth and sucks it in, and Bucky groans, an arm sliding around the small of his back to drag him flush against Bucky’s front. He hums when Steve's tongue piercing strokes against his tongue, obviously pleased. He has to lean down some distance to kiss Steve, and he huffs a short laugh into Steve’s mouth at the angle, when he finally lifts his head, eyes half-lidded and pleased. 

“I don’t wanna make a dumb-ass size joke here but this is a bit awkward,” he says against Steve’s lips.

Steve delivers a stinging bite to Bucky’s addictive bottom lip. “Get used to it, jackass.”

“I intend to, tiny jerk,” Bucky says, straightening. His hands slide to Steve’s hips again, and settle. “But not tonight. No rush, right?”

Steve smiles. “I guess not.”

Bucky looks at him with an expression that can only properly be placed on a fat cat that’s just had a luxurious meal. Steve laughs lightly, shaking his head. He presses the pad of his thumb to the corner of Bucky’s mouth, those red, red lips. “The mouth on you, punk.”

“On _me_ ,” Bucky says on a laugh. “What about _your_ mouth?” and he dips down to kiss it one more time, slow and lingering. His hands slide, unobtrusive and hot, up Steve’s shirt, and palm the bare skin of his sides. Steve shudders, swallowing back a groan. Bucky’s hands are big.

“Big fan of your eyes too,” Bucky mumbles, extracting a hand from Steve’s clothes to bring it up and steal the glasses away, dragging his damp lips up to press a kiss to his right eyelid.

“Sweet-talker,” sighs Steve, smiling.

“I’m all about the romance, babe,” says Bucky, straightening away with a sad sigh. He puts Steve’s glasses back on with exquisite care, and then lets his hands drop to Steve’s shoulders. With a softs noise of surprise at remembering, he digs in his coat pocket and settles the inhaler on the nearby kitchen counter.

“See you soon?”

“I’ll call you,” Steve nods. “I think I have an idea.”

“Oh?” Bucky widens his eyes. “Did you have it before it was cool?”

“Get the fuck out of my apartment,” snaps Steve, getting on his toes to smack one last kiss on Bucky’s mouth, before turning him around and shoving him out the door.

“Will it be vegan?” Bucky asks, laughing, as he turns around on the hallway.

“Good night, Bucky,” says Steve, exasperated.

Bucky throws out his hands urgently. “Wait, wait, this is important!”

Steve pauses with the door half open, arching his brows.

“Should I get a beanie?”

Steve slams the door closed.


	4. Frank's Bar

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Frank's Bar is an actual bar in Buenos Aires. If you're ever in Argentina, absolutely check it out, the place is awesome and the drinks are amazing.

Thursday of the next week, it’s cold enough that Bucky is actually wearing a calf-long wool coat over his otherwise punkish clothes.

“Did you steal that?”

“Yeah,” says Bucky, grinning wolfishly. “From my unstylish past.”

“Would that we could go back in time,” Steve laments, wrapping a warm scarf around his throat and chin.

Bucky shakes his head fondly, tugging down the last loop of Steve’s scarf to lean in and press a slow, deep kiss into his mouth.

“You wanna go out or not?” Steve mumbles a few minutes later, somewhat breathless, against those stunning lips.

“Yeah,” Bucky clears his throat and straights, tangling his fingers idly in the hair at the back of Steve’s neck. “Yeah, come on.”

Steve tightens the scarf back up and says nothing when Bucky picks up the inhaler without a word and drops it in his own coat pocket. Shivers when Bucky presses himself up along his back as Steve’s busy locking his front door.

“You like Queen, right?” he asks, catching Bucky by the hand as they go down the stairs.

“Queen as in the queen of England, queen as in an extravagant gay man, or queen as in Freddy Mercury?”

Steve gives him a flat look. “Why would I care if you like the queen of England?”

Bucky shrugs. “You hipster people have the oddest fixations.”

“Oho,” laughs Steve, incredulous. “This from the man wearing enough metals studs to sink to the bottom of the river in a second flat.”

Bucky snorts, pulling Steve in to his side with his left hand on his waist. They take a cab, because it’s fucking cold, and Steve is not above snuggling against Bucky’s side in the backseat. It’s been two weeks and Bucky’s clothes have stopped smelling of cigarette smoke. He has lollypops on his coat pockets all the time, berry and strawberry and tutti-frutti, mint gum and candy for whenever he’s in the mood for it.

Bucky’s making a real effort here, is the thing, and Steve isn’t sure how to reply to any of it. Instead he dips forward and presses a chaste kiss to the apple of Bucky’s throat, inhaling his mild aftershave and the masculine smell of him where it gathers at the base of his throat. Bucky hums, carding his fingers gently through Steve’s hair.

“I do like Queen, by the way,” he says eventually, head resting back against the seat, eyes closed.

“Cool,” says Steve, grinning. “Cool cool cool.”

“Isn’t _Community_ too mainstream for your tastes?”

“I liked it before it was big,” Steve says flatly, and Bucky barks out a laugh, rich and genuine.

The can ride takes twenty minutes. Steve makes them get off at a garage, which Bucky finds confusing, and then insists on paying the cab ride and the tickets, which makes Bucky blink at him.

“Tickets to what, and where?”

“There’s much you need to learn, young padawan,” Steve says seriously, tugging him by the hand into the garage door.

“You know what, I’m starting to think you’re just a nerd with a frankly questionable sense of style—are we breaking into somewhere, because if we are, I want written proof I’m just along for the ride.”

Steve snorts, twisting the heavy doorknob and pushing with his shoulder to open the massive door. “Weary of adding more shit to your considerable rap sheet?”

“Smart people like me don’t get caught, smartass.”

The garage is empty, but for one lone, illuminated phone booth in the back, standing against the door. Its back wall is mirrored, and Bucky stares at it, bewildered, until he realizes there is actually a couple huge guys, obviously bouncers, sitting in tall stools inconspicuously against the corner.

“Password?” one of them asks.

“Howling Commandos,” says Steve without hesitation.

“Dial five four two,” the bouncer says, nodding.

“What the hell,” asks Bucky, trailing after Steve helplessly because Steve is dragging him by the hand.

Steve laughs quietly, picks up the phone and obediently dials five four two. For a moment, he stares at Bucky with an honestly smug expression, and then grins when the back wall of the phone booth, the mirrored one, actually swings inwards. Bucky’s lips part. Steve laughs, dragging him inside.

“Welcome to Frank’s Bar,” he says, sliding his arms around Bucky’s waist.

“What is this, like, a gangster bar?” Bucky asks, awed and delighted. His eyes are bright in the dim bar lighting, tracking along everything as quickly as he can take it in.

“Yeah, actually, it’s back from the Prohibition era. Although I’m fairly certain the phone booth’s new, ‘cause a phone booth in the middle of a garage is plain weird.”

Bucky’s still ogling the place, gaze darting between the old fashioned couches and nooks and mismatched tables and armchairs and loveseats, and it takes him a moment to notice the band setting up in a small area at the back. Steve leads him to one of the smaller tables, flicks aside the ‘saved – Steve Rogers’ sign and settles next to Steve on the small, low sofa.

Bucky reaches over and takes over the drink menu, whistling at the extravagant names.

“I think I’ll just have a gin and tonic,” he settles on dubiously.

“Adventurous,” drawls Steve. “Why don’t I pick for you, big guy?”

“Nothing fruity, jackass.”

“Like strawberry isn’t your latest obsession, who’re you trying to fool, buddy?”

He orders their drinks and a serving of thai chicken balls for them, and they settle in, comfortable, intimate in the darkness. Bucky’s left arm is around Steve’s shoulders, casually possessive, and his knees are spread with that easy confidence he has that makes him take up a lot more space he otherwise would. His lips taste of gin and spice when he kisses Steve, hand on Steve’s neck, fingers catching his chin to angle his face just right. The muscle of his thigh is firm and long when Steve drops his hand to it, feeling bold, stunned at having the right.

Steve’s not a virgin, and he’s been around his fair share; he knows what he’s got going for him and he knows what he likes and he’s not shy about trying to get it, and he’s been with very attractive men before. But Bucky—the only word Steve can come up with is Bucky _dotes_ on him, which is weird as hell, a little bit vexing, and actually surprisingly flattering. More than a little bit touching, too.

Steve likes it, and he likes Bucky, and he likes that Bucky’s so obvious about liking him back. Straightforward men are, surprisingly, hard to come by. Steve’s never had the patience for fooling around, so Bucky’s no-nonsense attitude towards getting it on with him is refreshing and extremely attractive.

The band is good. Really good. They play Queen songs for an hour and a half, and then grinningly  agree to take on requests from the crowd. The bar’s filled up now, and although there are eyes everywhere, the cramped space makes their little sofa and table feel even more intimate. Steve dares to hook a leg over Bucky’s sturdy thigh, and shudders when Bucky drops his hand to it easily, fingertips resting warm and idle along Steve’s inner thigh.

His eyes burn when he turns to face Steve, face flushed in the bar’s heat. He almost blocks out the light with the breadth of his shoulders when he leans over to kiss Steve, deep and slow and sinful, hands sneaking in under Steve’s shirt to palm his stomach, unabashed and unembarrassed. Steve gasps, clenches his hand on Bucky’s shoulder, bunching up the soft cotton of his grey Henley. The dog tags fall out of Bucky’s open collar, slapping on Steve’s chest with a soft clink that’s surprisingly loud below the band’s amazing rendition of Otis Redding’s ‘Sitting on the Dock of the Bay’.

They order their third round of drinks and kiss through ‘California Dreaming’, ‘Hit the Road Jack’. They blink and laugh through ‘Paparazzi’, along with everyone else, although this cover of it is pretty awesome.

“Oh, you know what I think you’re gonna like?” Bucky says, suddenly excited, when Steve drinks down the last of his third drink. “There’s this little dive of a pub I know that’s a tattoo museum and they have an old jukebox.”

Steve’s brows arch. “A new retro-looking jukebox or an actual old jukebox?”

“Can you _get_ any more hipster, for fuck’s sake? Come on, let’s go.”

Steve pays, despite Bucky’s protests, and they stumble out of the bar into the shockingly cold night, laughing slightly, already buzzed. Down the block the other way, a group of about half a dozen guys are uproariously leaving an apartment building, obviously drunk, singing a painfully out of tune version of Yellow Submarine. Steve hums idly along, pressing his nose against Bucky’s shoulder.

“Gonna let me pay the cab, Stevie?” Bucky asks breathlessly, pulling Steve flush against his front as he squints down the street to see if a cab is forthcoming.

“You can’t hijack my date, you tasteless punk,” Steve retorts, sinking his hands into Bucky’s coat pockets because his fingers are freezing and Bucky’s like a fucking stove.

“It’s gonna be _my_ date if we go to my bar, Steve.”

“No, no, see, I started it—“

What happens next happens so fast Steve isn’t quite sure _how_ it happens. There’s a loud banging sound, like a firecracker, and then a dizzying motion and startlingly fierce pain along the back of Steve’s head and his shoulders. Air, that precious thing he’s always fighting for, escapes him entirely in one painful gasp. Something crushes his chest, and then a handtangles in the front of his jacket and drags him down until he scrapes his hands on the dirty sidewalk. He’s being pushed insistently down and against the wall, being kept there by—

“Buck,” he manages, breathless and in pain. “What the hell—“

Bucky’s face is slack and pale, lips parted and eyes wide with terror. He’s huddling down, curling over Steve, shoving him down against the wall and— _shielding_ him. Shielding him with his own body.

Fuck. It dawns on Steve like a slap to the face.

Bucky heard _bang_ and thought _explosion_ and his first instinct was to protect Steve, and now—now Steve sees he’s folding, crumbling inwards into a panic attack. His breath is sharp and quick, rasping in his tightening throat.

“Buck,” Steve rasps, lifting his hands slowly to clutch at Bucky’s chest. “Bucky, it’s ok, I’m fine, were safe.”

None of to seems to get through to Bucky, whose breathing pace continues to increase alarmingly. His hands are shaking, now, where they’re fisted at Steve’s chest and arm. The shaking is almost violent in Bucky’s left, visible and worrying.

“Bucky, come on, it’s ok, just breathe with me, you know how to do this.”

Steve doesn’t actually know if Bucky knows how to do this. Bucky mentioned being diagnosed, said he can’t sleep, admitted to trouble adapting to civilian life, but he never mentioned anything about panic attacks or episodes of flashbacks and triggers. It makes sense that he’s had them, but if he hasn’t seen a doctor yet, it’s very likely he hasn’t been given the tools to deal with the consequences of his trauma.

Steve needs to get out of his current position, though, because he can’t help Bucky if Bucky’s pinning him to the wall. He tries to disengage gently, but Bucky still makes wounded noises of concern and tries to prevent him from moving, still trying to—to fucking _protect_ him, and that breaks Steve’s heart.

He’s docile enough, though, when Steve insists and gets himself up, turns Bucky so he’s sitting up against the wall. He fumbles for a moment in Bucky’s pockets to find his inhaler, because his chest isn’t making any progress recovering from being crushed to the wall by Bucky’s considerably larger frame, and he can’t be wheezing if Bucky’s sliding into an episode. One of them needs to be okay.

“Woah,” someone says above them, and Steve whirls around to see the drunk guys have come closer, and are looking at them curiously. “He ok?”

“No,” says Steve helplessly. “The noise. He’s a war veteran.”

That takes a long moment to sink in, and the guys are considerably drunk, so their reaction is slow. One of them, though, someone Steve supposes must be a designated driver or babysitter, understands at once, and herds his friends back.

“How do we help?” he asks, crouching next to Steve and resting his hand in Steve’s shoulder, warm and reassuring. His glasses slide down his nose and his eyes are kind and soft. Steve is so fucking grateful someone’s sober and willing to help.

He takes a deep breath and tries to _think_. Bucky’s having a flashback, or a panic attack, or _something_ , triggered by the sound of an explosion. Okay, so, panic attacks—Steve’s read about them before, he knows how to help with those. Maybe it’ll be enough.

“Bucky,” he says, ducking until he can catch Bucky’s terrified eyes. It’s heartbreaking to see him like this, his confident and cocky Bucky, but Steve shoves that thought away. He wants to hold Bucky’s hands, but he’s not sure Bucky wants to be touched, and he doesn’t want to make this any worse. “Bucky, it’s okay. You’re safe. We’re in New York. We’re home. We’re not in any danger.”

“You want me to call someone?” the sober guy asks, softly, gesturing firmly at his friends to quiet down and move back.

“Just gimme a minute to see if I can bring him down. Bucky, you know me, right? I’m Steve. We’re here in New York, you’re with me, we’re safe.”

Bucky’s eyes flicker up at the mention of Steve’s name, lost and searching. Steve smiles encouragingly, shifting a bare inch closer. “You remember me, right? Stevie, the hipster jerk?”

Bucky blinks. His left hand is shaking badly, but his right makes a small motion, like an aborted reach. Slowly, to give him time to reject the move, Steve reaches out and takes his right hand in his. Bucky’s hand is shockingly cold. He’s wracked by shivers where he sits, his breathing still way too fast. Okay, Steve knows how to help with that, at least.

Bucky’s grip tightens at once, painful, and Steve has to put a lot of effort into not showing his wince. Bucky’s pretty strong.

“Buck, I need you to slow down your breathing,” he says gently, pressing Bucky’s hand to his own chest and inhaling pointedly. His mom used to do this with him, when he was little. “Follow me, okay? Breathe in. Hold it and count to three. Then release it until there’s nothing left. Come on, you can do this. Breathe with me.”

Slowly, Bucky does. He matches his breathes to Steve’s, deep and even and slow. His right hand, held between Steve’s hand and Steve’s chest, stops shaking. Steve sees the slope of his shoulders relax, go almost limp. It’s like every muscle in Bucky’s body relaxes at once, and he breathes out, blinking slowly, and when he looks up at Steve his eyes are aware again. Steve could cry from relief.

“Bucky,” he says, squeezing his hand.

“Steve,” rasps Bucky.

Steve turns to the guy. “Could you hail us a cab?”

“Sure, hang on,” he stands up and enrolls his friends’ help in getting them a cab. Steve lets Bucky sit until they have one stopping right in front of them, but then he has a new problem. Bucky’s legs are shaky and he can’t quite stand up.

“Is it alright if I help?” the sober guy asks quietly. Bucky looks up at him, uncertain, but nods. Steve hates that someone else has to help them, but Bucky’s several pounds of solid muscle heavier than him, uncoordinated and fatigued. They get Bucky in the back seat, and Steve could almost hug this guy.

“Don’t mention it, man, I’m sorry my friends scared him. I hope he gets better soon. Look me up on Facebook and let me know, okay? I’m Bruce Banner.”

Steve nods, already sliding into the cab next to Bucky, who’s sitting obediently in the seat, staring straight ahead and seemingly seeing nothing. Steve things he’s heard about that, the hundred-yard stare.

He squeezes almost hard enough to hurt when Steve slides his left hand into Bucky’s right, but he’s silent the whole twenty minutes it takes them to go back to Steve’s apartment. It occurs to Steve that Bucky’s home would be better, maybe, but he doesn’t know where Bucky lives, and isn’t sure Bucky’s up to answering questions yet. Besides, he’ll have Natasha nearby if it gets bad again, and he’s sure Natasha would be a big help.

Listless, disturbingly silent and blank-faced, Bucky sits slowly down on Steve’s couch and sinks his head into his hands. Steve doesn’t know what to do to make any of this any better. He knows when he has bad episodes he likes stupid movies and hot tea and snacks, but he doesn’t know how to tell Bucky that he’ll go out right now and get a cinnamon roll of those he adores if that’ll make Bucky look more like himself, because this shade, this ghost of the Bucky he knows is tearing him apart.

“I’m sorry,” Bucky says suddenly, voice a rasp. Steve startles, gets a bottle of water from the fridge and takes it to him.

“There’s nothing to be sorry for, Buck,” he murmurs, offering it. Bucky doesn’t take it. He shifts only to press the heels of his hands into his eyes. The left one still shakes badly.

“Did I hurt you?” he asks, sounding like he’s forcing himself to spit the words.

Steve realizes he has to walk a fine line between reassuring Bucky and telling him the truth. He thinks of the back of his head, which throbs, and his shoulders and back, which will bruise, and the familiar desperate pain of his lungs unable to expand.

“I’ll be alright,” he says honestly. “I’m sturdier than I look.”

What comes out of Bucky’s mouth is not quite a laugh, not quite a sob. “I’m a fucking mess, Steve.”

Steve gives in to the urge and wraps an arm around Bucky’s hunched shoulders, pulls him in to press a kiss to his clammy temple.

“You’ll get better,” he says, with all the strength of his conviction and his trust in Bucky.

Bucky shakes his head slowly, sluggish. “I’m so tired,” he whispers, and his voice sounds like he’s on the brink of tears, so fucking broken and small that Steve’s chest aches like it’s caving inwards. “I’m so fucking tired, Steve.”

Steve draws in a shaky, painful breath. “You think you could get some sleep of we lie down?”

Bucky sighs, wet and long. “I don’t know.”

“Wanna try?”

He nods slowly, so Steve takes his right hand and tugs him up, leads him to the bedroom. Bucky almost collapses on the edge of the bed, fumbling clumsily with the ties on his combat boots until Steve crouches down and gets them for him. It’s odd to see Bucky curled in on himself on his side, eyes open and vacant. Bucky has such a startlingly outwards personality that seeing him like this feels—wrong, somehow, like Steve is being privy to something he can tell Bucky would rather keep private.

When Steve gets his own shoes off and slides into the other side of the bed, Bucky turns around to face him, eyes heavy-lidded and exhausted.

“I’m sorry,” he mumbles, looking embarrassed.

“’sok,” says Steve again, patiently, and smiles a bit. “I still had fun tonight, and I’m glad we went out together.”

Bucky’s lopsided smile is more like him than anything he’s done in the last forty-five minutes, and Steve feels like his lungs readjust and he can finally breathe right again. “I kinda did hijack your date, though, huh.”

“Punk,” Steve decrees affectionately.

“Jerk,” returns Bucky, eyes falling closed.

Steve doesn’t know exactly how much trouble Bucky has falling asleep, or staying asleep, on his own or with others. But here in Steve’s bed with Steve, he falls almost at once into a deep sleep, and he doesn’t seem to be dreaming, or doesn’t move when he dreams. Steve hopes it’s restful; he hopes Bucky gets better, he hopes he fucking did something right to help him tonight.

He consciously relaxes himself, listening to Bucky’s even breaths, and lets them lull him to sleep.


	5. Morning Sunshine

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Haha the title for this chapter, god. I did warn you guys that I am trash. 
> 
> You guys have all been amazing and awesome! Thank you for reading and commenting and I am very glad you've enjoyed this story. 
> 
> There's porn ahead, and also I did not have a beta and did not feel like re-reading because I am _lazy_ trash so if there are typos or mistakes or such, feel free to let me know!

He wakes up because he feels like he’s cooking in a goddamn oven.

He’s on his back, and Bucky’s pressed up along his side, one arm draped over his stomach, one leg thrown over his. Apparently Bucky’s back to taking up as much space as he possibly can, and if that means he has to physically occupy the same spot Steve’s lying on, that’s apparently acceptable.

Steve is covered in a sheen of sweat. His shirt is sticking to his chest and back, clammy and uncomfortable. He tries, as discreetly as possible, to wiggle himself out from Bucky’s heavy limbs, but he might as well be fending off an octopus.

“I’m roasting alive,” he mutters, a drop of sweat rolling down his temple. “This is how I die.”

“You’re a ball of sunshine in the mornings, huh,” mumbles Bucky, face pressed in Steve’s shoulder.

“Here lies Steve Rogers, my gravestone will read, killed by heat in bed with a punk,” Steve stops and squints at the ceiling. Bucky snorts, body shaking with laughter. “That sounded better in my head.”

Bucky laughs out loud, arm tensing to drag Steve closer on the bed, like Steve isn’t fucking hot enough, thanks.

“You want some heat, baby?” he asks raunchily, and pulls Steve’s closest hand down to his groin, where his dick is notoriously hard through his jeans.

“Wow,” says Steve, awed. “You’re a real class act, Barnes.”

“Would you shut up for a hot second,” mumbles Bucky, getting up on an elbow to lean down and kiss Steve full in the mouth. Steve indulges him for a moment, then turns his face away.

“Brush your teeth, asshole.”

“Men are pigs and you like men, deal with it,” murmurs Bucky, turning his face back and kissing him again, deep and filthy. He kisses like he owns Steve’s mouth, like it’s his, teeth and tongue and lips, tangling his fingers into Steve’s hair. He shifts his weight to settle more securely on top of Steve, his hard dick cradled on the crook of Steve’s pelvis, the v of thigh and hip.

Steve gasps, fisting a hand in the shoulder of Bucky’s shirt, hips stuttering. Bucky kisses him, deep and leisurely, until Steve, restless and heated, blush climbing up his chest and neck, fumbles with Bucky’s belt and zipper until he can sneak a hand into his boxers.

Bucky bucks into him. He unexpectedly rises up, shoving the covers away, and swings a leg to straddle Steve’s thighs, pulling his shirt up over his head. Steve doesn’t try to resist the urge to run his hands up and down that impressive chest, miles of pale skin, unblemished up to the point where left arm meets shoulder. A scattering of small scars like pockmarks and scratches mars the skin there, still new and pink, and the left arm is noticeably thinner than the right, making Bucky look unbalanced. Steve pauses, wrapping his hand around that thinner wrist, frowning slightly.

“What’re you comfortable with on this?”

Bucky hesitates. “I’d rather you pretend it’s no different than the other arm.”

“Alright,” Steve agrees at once, dropping that wrist to settle both of his palms on the jutting bones of Bucky’s hips, then slide them slowly down and in to where his cock is jutting out from the open jeans and lowered boxers, hard and long. He takes it in hand and pulls, and Bucky shudders, weight dropping into Steve more securely, like gravity is pulling him down, Steve winces slightly—Bucky’s fucking heavy, he’s got actual muscle on him.

“Sorry,” mutters Bucky, removing himself and dropping to the bed on his back, dragging Steve over him instead.

Steve sighs. “I don’t always have to be on top,” he says testily, although he really can’t complain, because he’s unbuttoning his own jeans, draping himself over Bucky to take both of their cocks in hand and thrust. Bucky gasps.

“Good, ‘cause I like riding,” Bucky says breathlessly. A spear of heat goes right through Steve’s chest, and his cheeks burn. He thinks of Bucky, all that flat muscle and solid strength and the breadth of those shoulders, riding his cock, and breathes in long and deep. The scent of musk and masculine sweat.

“Yeah?” he asks, nonsensical, giving their cocks a hard tug.

Bucky thrusts up into him, bending a knee to plant a foot on the bed and put actual muscle to work, rocking, a sinuous and fluid motion, sensual and hot enough to steal Steve’s breath.

Bucky’s hand finds the nape of his neck, and he drags Steve down to an open-mouthed, sloppy kiss.

It’s slow and heady and hot, and it last actually longer than Steve had expected considering the intensity of his attraction to Bucky. Their come stripes across Bucky’s stomach and chest and he doesn’t seem to give one shit, just goes limp and relaxed on the bed, eyes closed, lips parted on rushed breaths. Steve slumps along his side, equally breathless, almost uncomfortably hot.

“Damn,” says Bucky after a moment, blinking hazily at the ceiling. “I really want a cig right now.”

Steve sighs. “You can have _one_ , Buck. It’s okay.”

Bucky hesitates. “Nah. I’m already almost done quitting, it’s been like a week since I smoked one. I just, you know,” he gestures vaguely at his mouth, red and swollen from kissing. “Have an oral fixation.”

Steve tiredly lifts his head to squint at him. “Did you actually just say that?”

“I like sucking on things,” says Bucky, looking at him with wide, innocent blue eyes. “Why? You got stuff you like sucked?”

“Wow,” blinks Steve. “This is literally the worst innocent act I have ever seen in my life. This is another thing you suck at, I hope you know that.”

“Will you shut up, I’ve been awake like, twenty minutes, and I spent nineteen of those getting off. You want clever pillow talk, ask me for it when it’s not an ungodly hour of the morning.”

Steve lifts his left wrist and looks at his watch, then flicks Bucky an exasperated look. “It’s eleven am.”

“Ungodly!” cries out Bucky, throwing up his right arm, because his left is trapped under Steve’s neck.

“You’re such a bum, why do I even like you?”

“I’m hot and give really good blowjobs,” answers Bucky. Before Steve can say something to that, he adds, “I also can make killer pancakes if you have the ingredients.”

The idea of pancakes stalls Steve’s impulse to be a dick.

“Tall tales,” he says instead, lifting off Bucky’s arm to get out of bed. “You better have the skills to back that statement, or else.”

“Star coffee, shithead, I’ll be up in a minute to feed your useless ass.”

Steve scowls at him. “I will, but because I want to, not because you tell me to.”

“Oh my fucking god,” groans Bucky, dragging a pillow over his head and lying there like a dead fish, come-streaked, flushed, cock still out and flaccid against the crook of his thigh. Absolutely gorgeous.  Steve aches to draw him, not for the first time. “You argumentative little shit, I swear, I don’t fucking deserve this at this hour of the morning.”

“It’s eleven am!”

“Coffee!” cries Bucky, snatching the pillow and throwing it in Steve’s direction.

“God, you’re demanding,” Steve mutters, scampering.

He doesn’t even pretend to be annoyed, though, when Bucky comes to the kitchen and presses all along his back, shirtless, kissing the crest of his bony shoulder. There’s a moment of comfortable, contemplative silence, and then Bucky says, quietly: “I’m not gonna be easy, you know. Shit like what happened last night—happens. Not a lot, but it happens.”

Steve sighs. “We’ll figure it out, Buck. I’m difficult too.”

Bucky kisses his shoulder again and removes himself to lean against the counter, looking at Steve with a lopsided smile, painfully handsome unshaven and sleep-rumpled.

“I’m gonna need,” he starts, dragging out the last word as he drags a hand up from the small of Steve’s back up to the nape of his neck, comfortable and possessive. “sugar, milk, eggs, flour and butter.”

“Shit, I don’t have any eggs left. Can you do without?”

“No,” says Bucky cheerfully, shoving away from the counter and sauntering, shirtless, belt undone, barefoot, to the front door. “I bet Natasha has some!”

“Uh, I don’t think—hold on a sec—“

Bucky’s already out the door, leaving it open, and Steve can hear him knocking in Natasha’s front door fit to break it down. At eleven am on a Friday, Natasha’s probably on her third hour of sleep.

Steve sips coffee and wonders if Natasha will know how to realign a broken nose, after she breaks it.

 


End file.
